Our home environment has changed over the past few years with more and more devices becoming available with remote controls. A few of these devices include garage doors, TVs, DVD players, VCRs, audio systems, the list goes on. It seems that we enjoy having control over our home when and where we want it.

The trend towards automating our home seems to be increasing. A study by ABI Research in 2003 predicted that the home automation market in the United States of America (USA) would rise from $1.5 billion to more than $3.8 billion US dollars by 2008. This market growth can be seen in Figure 2.1 (Hansen, 2004, in ABI Research).

Figure 1: Aggregate Home Controls Revenue USA: 2002 to 2008

In 2004 the National Association of Home Builders conducted a survey and found the top ten technologies that home buyers were after. When it came to home automation 45% wanted structured wiring. Structured wiring places electrical, audio and video and data lines of a home on the same network. Home owners also want greater control of their security, energy, lighting and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system. These can be seen below in Figure 2.2 (Hansen, C., 2004, in National Association of Home Builders, 2004)

Figure 2: Top 10 Home Technology Features Home Buyers Want.

At the moment structured wiring and other home automation technologies are restricted to new homes. This is with the exception of those that use powerline, and even these are limiting.

Wireless

We have seen an increasing interest in wireless technologies such as Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN), Bluetooth and of course, the mobile handset. This interest, coupled with the rising trend towards home automation, opens up a market for wireless home automation.

The emergence of wireless home automation technologies means that those interested in automating their home can do so without the cost of installing new cables. This is good news for those wanting to automate an existing home and great news for vendors wanting to take advantage of the retrofit market. Wireless products also mean greater flexibility during installation and mobility of devices. Wireless, in the context of this thesis, means radio frequency (RF) technology.

On June 8, 2005 Instat, a market forecaster of semiconductors and advanced communications equipment, released a report ‘802.15.4 SoC & SiP Surge as ZigBee Faces Residential Competition’ (#IN0501836MI) (Instat, 2005). This report covered the worldwide 802.15.4 market and found that silicon developments for System-on-Chip (SoC) and System-in-Package (SiP) solutions have been moving at a quick pace.

The main points to highlight from the study are:

• On an aggressive basis, 802.15.4 nodes/chipsets could grow by a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 200% from 2004 to 2009, with annual shipments surpassing 150 million units in 2009
• Commercial building control is expected to capture the lion’s share of the 802.15.4 market, in terms of node/chipset volumes, but not design wins
• SiP and SoC solutions will drive easier system/product development and lower the costs of adding this wireless capability to sensor networks

From these figures we can see that the wireless market is expanding and that others in the market are benefiting also.

Tags: zigbee, ZigBee Project, IEEE 802.15.4, Mesh Networks, Home Automation, Wireless Home Automation